You strike a bargain.

"Can you tell me anything about BIGINC?" You ask Powersurge, taking a gamble and trusting him.

"BIGINC eh?" Powersurge muses, rubbing his chin. "I suppose I shoulda guessed with you being an assassin and all. Whats it worth if I tell you what I know?"

"How much do you want?" You ask, riffling the wad of credits the Ogre bartender gave you for the fight.

"I wasn't thinking about cash." The cybernetically altered player laughed. "Watching you tussle with those whores was pretty hot and I've never had a Dark Elf before. You do know this game is fully interactive don't you? Have you had a chance to try out that cyberpussy yet?"

"Sure, it's had a test run or two." You reply. "But how do I know your information is worth it?"

"I guess you don't." Powersurge grinned and leant forward. "But that enhancement must have cost a fair chunk of your startup credits. You wouldn't have got it unless you intended to make frequent use of it."

The guy has a point, you chose this character more for the opportunity to fuck in a girl's body than anything else. Besides which you're trying to bargain with something that so far you've had to give away for free. Now that you're sure other players don't have access to your real life identity and seem to treat avatars as they appear without asking questions you feel liberated to experiment more.

"Point taken." You concede. "I'd have probably fucked if you'd asked whether you could help me or not."

"Now that's a fact you shouldn't spead around too much." Powersurge advised laughing. "There's a lot of horny guys in here. Fucking NPC's is pretty good with their advanced AI, but everyone really wants to nail other players. That fine ass is too good a bargaining chip to give away free. I'll tell you anything I can about Big and BIGINC, that way I can feel I didn't cheat you."

"Mr Big suddenly appeared on the scene a few weeks back." The cybermage went on to explain. "Everyone figures he musta changed his ID cause of the way he just shoed up at very high level overnight. He muscled his way in on a coupla crime rackets to give himself a base. Next thing he's hunting down low to mid level criminal types and either absorbing them into his organisation or rubbing them out if they refuse to join."

"So what, hadn't anyone done that before?" You ask.

"Oh, all the time since the game began." Powersurge says. "The difference with BIGINC is the speed with which it's grown. In less than two months Big has got as many henchmen and businesses under his thumb as dedicated players who have been playing for years. Gradually he's working his way up the food chain and starting to take on other player controlled outfits."

"So that's where the contracts on him come from, other players worried they're next on his target list?" You put in.

"Yeah, Big seems to be gunning for citywide takover of any criminal activity." The mage answered. "Anyone running a brothel, **** gang or other illegal business is fair game to Big."

"Freelancers and law enforcement types he leaves alone, only killing them if they interfere with him." The Powersurge tells you. "Even so half the assassins and merc teams in the city have died trying to get him."

"Here I'll transfer the locations and information on his properties that I know of to your wristcom." He presses some buttons on his own set. "There's probably loads more though, noone's sure how many players have sworn loyalty unofficially to Big without showing up in the database."

"Whew, that's a lot of information for me to trawl through." You say watching it scroll through your wristcom screen as it's downloaded. "Thanks Powersurge."

"I would say your thanks are thanks enough, but I'd be lying." The cybermage says. "You know what I want Fox."